Sri Lankan rebels open to peace talks

[ AP ]

Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tiger separatists are open to restarting peace talks with the government, despite the continuing military offensive aimed at crushing the group, a senior rebel official said. The two sides have been fighting for more than 25 years over the rebels’ demands for an independent state for minority Tamils in the north and east of this Indian Ocean island nation. A new military push deep into the rebel heartland in recent months has forced the Tamil Tigers to retreat from vast swaths of land they once controlled, and the government has said it expects to finish off the group in the coming months.